[4]
If by ‘actor’ here we mean ‘a man who can beat the shit out of everyone in the
room, even if they are armed with machine-guns, he is armed only with arms, and
they outnumber him at least eight-to-one.’

The game
ends when one person takes umbrage over some sneery remark about ‘lowest common
denominators’ as they learn, for example, that 11 people chose ‘Imagine’
compared to only 1 person, Sir Bradley Wiggins, choosing ‘The Queen is Dead’ (thus
‘proving’ that Sir BW is at least 11 times cooler than any given ‘Imagine’
drone).

Peace and
calm can be restored by collectively laughing at the number of people who chose
to listen ‘Dancing Queen’ for the rest of their lives, instead of, say, an
actual song (although this could cause more disharmony than the film ‘Mama Mia’
in some households).

On Radio 4 last week, we heard a representative
from the Society of Stuff to do with Butterflies explain how some of Britain’s
butterflies are in decline. Now, I don’t know a great deal about butterflies
but I do know that with the mere flap of a wing, they can precipitate a
hurricane off the coast of Florida, a bush fire in Australia, or the melting of the Martian ice-caps. Clearly these meteorological bruisers are more
responsible for climate change than anyone would care to admit. However, the
only mention of butterflies in Paris was from David Cameron (of all people, eh?), who gets
butterflies every time he sits next to the Danish PM, and she wasn’t even there (probably). But
was there any mention the butterflies in the Paris Treaty? No.Apparently they were too busy eating
mango fingers.

Tuesday, 24 November 2015

John
Lennon, who wore glasses and was therefore clever, once said that he had been
an ‘instinctive socialist’ in his youth. I know what he meant. During my
adolescence, my own instincts led me to join CND, give up meat, be sympathetic to
feminism, and wear a Friends of the Earth t-shirt.
As I was too busy learning the guitar solos from ‘Sultans of Swing’, I never
got round to reading any of the literature. I still haven’t[1].

So,
a few years ago when my aunt explained to my oldest son that I had been a
Marxist in my youth, I was quite surprised[2]. I’d
never been moved to read anything by Marx[3],
mainly for his lack of guitar solos but also because of Communism, which I instinctively
felt was a bad idea. I suppose my aunt had looked at my list of right-on credentials
and concluded that I must have been a Marxist.

This
revelation passed without comment from said son, who has a philosophy degree,
has also read The Communist Manifesto[4] and
knows better than to take his father too seriously, but it did make me wonder
about any future conversations between my aunt and my brother’s children. My
brother voted Tory in 1987, viewed my meat-free-peacenik-treat-women-as-equals-etc
with disdain, and landed a job in London which had absolutely nothing to do
with altruism and everything to do with earning a lot of money, and I fear that
she thus may have jumped to another conclusion and will explain to my nephews that their father
was a Nazi in his youth.

There
was going to have been a point to this piece of scribbling, but I got too far away from it, so
will leave it for another day. As compensation for wasting your time here's a new definition
of Marxist for you, based on my own experiences:

Marxist,
noun: sanctimonious dunderhead,
usually ignorant [esp. of own status].

Monday, 23 November 2015

It is the battle of Waterloo, and
Major Peregrine Carruthers is talking to his batman,

Private Humphreys. They are
waiting for Blucher’s army to arrive.

‘I
say, Sgt. Humphreys: what’s that smell?’

‘I
believe it’s more of a whiff than a smell, sir.’

‘Yes,
but what is it?’

‘It’s grapeshot, sir.’

‘A
whiff of grapeshot, eh? Is that good or bad?’

‘On
the whole, it’s not that good, sir.’

‘Not
that good? How so?’

‘Well,
it’s a bag full of metal balls fired from a cannon; the bag explodes all over the
enemy, killing them.’

‘Nonsense,
boy! You can’t get killed by a canvas bag!’

‘I
believe it’s the metal balls which do the killing, sir.’

‘That
would certainly make more sense.’

‘Indeed,
sir.’

‘Well,
we’d better be leaving then, hadn’t we?’

‘Really,
sir? Shouldn’t we stay and fight?’

‘You
may be a brave and fearless warrior, Humphreys, but that’s no reason for me to
hang about getting killed. Look around you. There are thousands of soldiers. I
won’t be missed.’

‘But
you can’t just run away at the first whiff of grapeshot!’

John Humphreys on R4 this morning
complained that the British-trained Iraqi Army ‘ran away at the first whiff of
grapeshot.’ His interviewee, rather than saying, ‘Well, wouldn’t you?’ just
carried on blah-ing (as is usually the case on Today, where the rules state
that the interviewers must not listen to the answers of the interviewees and
the interviewees must not answer the questions). He is, to coin a phrase, ‘Coward-shaming’
the Iraqi soldiers. What he meant to say was this: ‘at the first sign of the
murderous psychopaths of ISIS, armed with Kalashnikovs and beheading swords, and drooling at the thought of filling more mass graves, the Iraqi soldiers deserted.’

It is surely the pinnacle of crassness to call ISIS a ‘whiff of
grapeshot’ and it left me wondering if Mr H would
have stood his ground in the face of such... whiffs.

Monday, 12 October 2015

This is a free advert for Morrissey! Buy his new novel, 'List of the Lost', and you'll encounter these alliterative, assonant, repetitious and rhyming delights - just like the title itself!

Page 1

‘...yet hidden behind
the musculature that will fall in time at life’s finishing line.’

‘At such an avoidable call they shall be minus all...’

‘...calmly narcissistic ass-to-the-grass...’

Page 2

‘Imperishable, they train insatiably; companions in pleasure
and passionate in sentiments, they are the living picture of the desired
physique and the voluntary affection amongst friends that survives time.’

‘...yet here was a foursome to whom no outward event could
dent flesh or expression.’

Page 3

‘...the erotic reality of the deltoid deities who have no
inhibitions in bodies fully occupied and enjoyed.’

‘Heatedly, the four gather daily, minus boos and taboos...’

Page 4

‘Electrons from me need electrons from you in order to
become electrons.’

‘Our four favoured athletes have the task of relaying in
relay and can therefore knock aside bothersome border boundaries...’

Page 5

‘Second by second the body is ponderable, ponderable,
ponderable in any reflective surface.’

·Deficit – We’ll reduce the deficit by making it
smaller (like this – deficit);

·Debt – We’ll send the debt into outer space;

·Banks – All bankers to be sacked and re-employed
as food bank volunteers, while all food bank volunteers are to be re-employed
as bankers – the poor will have a fight on their hands but at least the banking system will be the
envy of no-one.

Education

‘Education is what happens when you’ve completed your
education’

·Close down all schools and convert them to giant
playrooms;

·We’ll abolish tuition fees and replace them with
Cafe Nero vouchers;

·All faith schools to be turned into assault
courses;

·All English universities to be moved to
Scotland.

Health

‘You’re alright so long as you have your health, and a few
other things, obviously’

·We’ll introduce a ban on the smoking ban;

·We’ll hide the NHS underwater.

[This 'Manifesto' was supposed to go out before the Generally Depressing Election, but didn't, because it wasn't finished, due to reasons. I didn't realise that I had written it until I stumbled across it this morning. That happens when I peer into the folders of my computer.]

Thursday, 25 June 2015

'Day' 1: About a week ago, William nominated me for the poem-a-day challenge. I would like in turn to nominate Thomas Cromwell. My first poem is from the Unsentimental School of Verse and is called 'The Flower'. It's not a good poem, but then, why should it be? No bloody flower's ever written a poem about me. I may do these in quick succession. Perhaps I should have written another poem about cats.

The Flower

It’s not my normal subject matter,the flower. Usually, I’d shyaway from trying to scratch some lineson such a thing: it holds no interestfor me at all. A flower’s justa flower. Don’t misunderstand me:I like their colours in the springand summer months, but mainly, whenthey’re there, I do not notice them;I do not miss them when they’re gone.

'Day' 2: Well, I'm now on day 2 of the poem-a-day challenge. I would like to nominate Judas Iscariot as the next poet. In the meantime, here's a woefully short permutational prose poem called 'Leftover Soup'.

Leftover Soup

I remain indifferent to your indifference. It leads us all to a better understanding of tintinnabulations. Let me show you how to order pizza using carrier pigeon. The last to arrive always spoils the party.

I remain indifferent to your Empire-building obsession. It leads us all into not-quite-blind-but-certainly-short-sighted-alleys. Let me show you the shortcut which will get you even more lost. The last instruction made about as much sense as a dolphin speaking Polish* (*like normal dolphin, but without the vowel sounds, capiche?).

I remain indifferent to your political opinions. They lead us all to conclude conclusively about your lack of sanity. Let me show you with this diagram. The last figure, although it looks rabbit-shaped, is, in fact, a hare (a hare Krishna).

'Day' 3: I made it as far as day 3 of the poem-a-day challenge. I now nominate any passing clouds who wish to identify as poets. The third poem looks like a stylistic mash-up of the first two inadequate poems (mainly iambic tetrameter meets repetition), but that's just coincidental. It's called: 'I Ran Out of Words for the Final Stanza (But At Least I Kept the Meter Going)'.

I Ran Out of Words for the Final Stanza(But At Least I Kept the Meter Going)

You said you had no need of friendship –until those big boys came along,then you were all, like, ‘Save me, save me!’It really was pathetic.

You said that things are never real –until they repossessed your house,and you were all, like, ‘That’s my house!’You’re such a hypocrite.

You said that arguments were futile –until you won one (quite by chance)and you were all, like, ‘Ar-Gu-MENT!’That way you turn the charm on.

'Day' 4: The penultimate day of the poem-a-day challenge. I neck-nominate Ronald McDonald for the Poetry Ice Bucket Challenge. As for the poem, it's a thing called 'je suis dystopia' and does not do justice to the title. As for the way it just stops. I mean, really. Is this the best I can do?

je suis dystopia

dystopiahas eight facebook friendswarfaminepestilencedeathand their horsespsychonutjobmad frankfluffydystopiastatus updatearmageddon itfour people like thisfour horses like thisdystopiahas created an eventapocalypse7 billion people are goingask dystopiafor a music recommendation

'Day' 5: Well, I made it: the poem-a-day challenge in less than an hour. For my final nomination, I would like to nominate Switzerland. For the last poem, and I use the term incorrectly, I have written a haiku. It may be the wrong season, but at least it mentions a season (in the title). Also, in Japanese, they don't have to have 17 syllables and are written on one line, so just what we think we're doing when we're writing haikus is anybody's bloody guess ('being lazy' is mine). It'scalled 'The First Haiku of Spring' and it goes like this:

You, with
your, ‘I’m staring into my Destiny’-face and your seventh favourite mirror. Always
the odd one out in a roomful of well-drawn expressions. Don’t believe everything
you see in portraits; apart from the frames.

Nobody told us that things would get worse before they got
even worse. Those with influence cultivated shrines to their own vanity. Meanwhile,
everyone ate far, far too much.

Nobody told us how to write a poem. Those with influence promoted
this ignorance. Meanwhile, everyone got off on their own brand of
computer-generated violence.

Nobody told us where to find Jesus on a Tuesday afternoon. Those
with influence secretly doubted the existence of Tuesdays. Meanwhile, everyone forgot
the words to their favourite Easter Egg.

Nobody told us about the deliciousness of mediocre
supermarket ready meals. Those with influence pretended to chop the vegetables.
Meanwhile, everyone dined on horsemeat surprise.

Nobody told us how to erase a past. Those with influence placed
gold coins on the eyelids of their deceased indiscretions. Meanwhile, everyone bypassed
the super-injunction by storming Twitter with pitchforks and moral outrage.

Nobody told us that the Queen’s Garden Parties included a
section for naturists. Those with influence left their invitations on the
mantelpiece to impress the visitors. Meanwhile, everyone bought corgi-flavoured
lollipops from the overpriced gifte shoppe.

Nobody told us because nobody knew. Those with influence wasted
their entire lives in the futile pursuit of holding on to their influence. Meanwhile,
everyone went back to watching TV.